Re: Modem encryption proposal

["Perry E. Metzger" <pmetzger@shearson.com>]

Miron Cuperman says:

> Let's talk less and do more. :)
> 
> How about adding encryption to kermit and iScreen so that they may
> talk to each other in a secure manner?  I am proposing these two
> programs because they are widely portable.  kermit works on most
> Unix and MSDOS systems.  iScreen works on most Unix systems.
> 
> (Note that this would solve the network/modem eavesdropping problem,
> but not the untrusted remote system problem.  The latter has no
> solution in my opinion.  You just have to trust the sysadmin.)
> 
> I propose writing a link encryption library which could be usable
> in other comm and BBS programs.

A good idea, but getting the protocol right is hard -- you don't want
to put any real overhead on the line, but you also want to do error
detection and resychronization so that your cypher will run properly.
Discussing a proposal for a line protocol that has these features
would, of course, be germane to the list.

Perry